


Centennial

by jamesilver



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Birthday, Bucky Barnes Has PTSD, Bucky Barnes's 100th birthday, Depression, Feels, Fluff, M/M, Multi, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Steve Rogers Has PTSD, Stucky - Freeform, Tony Stark is bad at speeches, also, post-winter soldier bucky, steve rogers has depression, the feels are gonna kill you i am so sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-10
Updated: 2016-03-10
Packaged: 2018-05-25 20:59:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6209926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jamesilver/pseuds/jamesilver
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In honor of James Buchanan Barnes's 100th birthday-- born March 10, 1916. </p><p>Steve is v depressed and feels super guilty about not being able to save Bucky.<br/>Bucky shows up in the 21st century woohoo!<br/>Bucky has a b-day and wow rehab is going really well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Centennial

**Author's Note:**

> headcanons include:  
> \- Tony Stark is v bad at speeches  
> \- Steve and Bucky's moms both believed strongly in herbal teas  
> \- Bucky does speak fluent Russian and if you don't think so you can fight me like he obvs was a trainer in the red room like thats cannon yo...so...  
> \- Also Pietro Maximoff is alive and anyone who says differently can also fight me bc he is my baby

November 9, 2015

"We have to find him. We can't just stop looking." 

"All the leads are cold, Steve," Sam said from his position on the supersoldier's couch. "It's been a year. He could be anywhere on the planet-- Hydra could even have him back." 

The older man stopped pacing, looking Sam directly in the eyes. "Let's not even think about that as a possibility." 

Sam leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "We might have to, Steve." 

"He wouldn't let them take him back," Steve insisted. Every time Sam brought up the fact that Bucky might still be in the hands of Hydra, this was exactly the argument that Steve went back to-- Bucky wouldn't let Hydra take him back. Steve didn't even continue on the usual rant this time. He knew what Sam's response would be: Hydra overpowered him multiple times before and they could do it again. "Sam, he knew me." Steve's eyes were locked on the floor, slowly tracing the patterns in his rug. 

"Just because you think so doesn't make it true. And, his memory could have been wiped again." Sam had pointed out all of these things more times than he could count. Steve had tunnel vision; he was ignoring all the possible variables and only wanted to see the tiniest chance that Bucky was somewhere he could find him. 

Steve crouched down on the floor, sighing deeply and running his hands through his hair. "No. Sam he knew me. Not at first. But he could have killed me. I was his mission. He was beating me and then there was this look of recognition. Sam, I'm telling you-- Hyrda didn't wipe me out of his mind completely. He wouldn't have saved me if he didn't know me."

Sam leaned back once more. Here they go again. "We don't know if he pulled you out of the water or not. I was there, Steve. That man did not know you. It's just your wishful thinking." 

There was a long pause. When Steve finally looked up, there were tears in his eyes and smeared across his face. "I can't give up, Sam," he barely whispered. "I can't do that to him."

Watching his friend be like this was almost too painful for Sam. "Steve, I know he's your best friend but--"

"No. You don't know. We were with each other to the end of the line, no matter what. When he fell off that train, I might as well have fallen with him. I have been numb ever since. The therapist that Shield assigned me thinks my numbness and depression are because I'm in an entirely different century where nothing is the same. But I've felt like this from the moment his hand missed mine and it hasn't stopped. Everyone thinks I'm so noble and sacrificial that I would drive that plane into the Arctic to save everyone-- and I would do it again-- but I didn't even want to try anything else. There was no point to living without Bucky and I didn't give death a second thought. Even with Peggy on the line. Love her so much but living with the guilt of having been so close to saving him was and is too much torture for me to live with. And then I find out that he's alive? My initial reaction was the best thing I have felt in longer than I could tell you. Then I realized that he was being tortured. That he didn't even know who I was. I could have fought back and overpowered him if I had felt like it, but I figured that if I had to die then it would be the perfect punishment for not being able to save him. I gave up. Once more, I accepted death as payment for not taking care of him as well as he always took care of me. You don't understand, Sam. A part of me fell off that train with him. A part of me felt his torture. I will not stop until I find him." 

 

November 10, 2015

Last night was terrible for Steve. His eyes opened and pain flooded his head from the cursed sunlight coming from between his curtains. After Sam had left, he had trudged through multiple breakdowns, the crazy amount of guilt overpowering him. So many times when he could have saved Bucky. The only reason Steve was still living was the possibility that he had one more chance to save the love of his life. 

He rolled over to check what time it was, last night's empty bottle number three felt under his back. Another failed attempt to get drunk that still had his head hurting the next morning. It was about eleven o'clock. The blonde swung himself upright, swiveling and placing his feet flat on the floor. The semi-hangover would last a couple more minutes and then it would be over, so he sat still for a minute. Last night's empty bottle number two was capped, staring at him from just outside his doorway. He knew without getting up that number one was in pieces on the kitchen counter, but he didn't feel like dealing with it just yet. 

Steve gave his head a sharp shake, the fog of the morning fully out of his mind. Shower, he needed a shower. He wondered when the last time he even showered was, looking at the ceiling as if a calendar would emerge and tell him. He also hadn't eaten in a while; the only thing in his system right now was three bottles of whiskey. God, he was just falling apart, wasn't he?

He stood up too quickly, ignoring the head rush that followed and walked into his kitchen, picking up bottle number two from the hallway and dropping it into his recycling bin. Everything staring back at him from the refrigerator was rotten. The bread was moldy, there was a can of soup that had busted open in a spot and most everything was stale. Out of everything in his apartment there was a can of cheez-whiz that he didn't remember buying and an unopened jar of frosting and everything else was inedible. He was even out of instant coffee. So, he added grocery shopping to his mental to-do list and got in the shower. 

It was freezing. He groaned under the stream of water, realizing he hadn't paid his water bill. If he didn't remember that, next was the electricity. But this was alright; Steve didn't mind cold showers. He was used to them. The cold was always a constant in his life. He was cold in Brooklyn, he was cold when he was sick (which was always), he was cold in the middle of nowhere in Europe in winter, he was cold flying over the Arctic, and it was still cold in Brooklyn today. He was just glad he wasn't out of soap yet. 

As he got dressed-- with the last set of clean clothes he had-- he complied a grocery list on the back of a receipt. He wrote down the essentials: milk, eggs, bread, ramen, animal crackers. He couldn't think of anything else to put on his list; he didn't know what he could possibly be making. Maybe he would pick up some boxes of Mac and cheese and some butter. Or some cereal. 

He was half asleep as he walked through the grocery aisles. While he was in produce trying to decide if he should get green bananas or if he would forget about them while waiting for them to ripe, a young boy ran past him wearing an Iron Man mask, pretending to fly. His mother was chasing after him, calling for him to "come back here right now, Timothy". 

It made Steve think of Clint's kids. The team was supposed to take a trip to visit them this weekend. Wanda was insistent that they all go visit the kids, but she just wanted to continue to gloat about the fact that she had been named Nathaniel Pietro Barton's godmother, yet again in honor of her brother. But every time he saw Clint's family it made him think about what his life might have been like if he hadn't died. Maybe he would have married Peggy and had children with her. But maybe he would have lost her anyway. 

He ended up back at home with much more than what was on his list-- including ice cream bars. All the things that had changed and you could still find ice cream bars everywhere. But something was strange. Something felt off. Like he was being watched. He shrugged the feeling away. It was nothing new and he wasn't the only one who felt strange after the Hydra infiltration last year. 

After unpacking the groceries and putting the paper bags into his recycling bin (because even depressed, Steven Grant Rogers will never fail to do even the smallest of right things), he quickly threw all of his dirty clothes into a laundry basket, heading downstairs and tossing them in the washing machine. He hoped he wouldn't forget about them. 

There are times when his body feels so heavy that he has to talk himself through his physical movements: close the door, close your eyes, breathe. So he leaned against the door with his eyes closed, slowly breathing out a sigh. Then he crumbled. Sank to the floor, unable to stand any longer. It was like Bucky was dead all over again. Except this time was worse. 

When Bucky fell off the train Steve had been torn apart. But the one thing that always saved him was that he imagined Bucky's spine snapping on impact so that he died immediately, unable to feel terrible and immobilizing pain. Turns out, Bucky had laid there in the snow for God know's how long probably feeling searing pain across every inch of his body until Hydra found him. And who knows what kind of shape his arm was at the bottom of that ravine-- if it was gone completely once he landed or if he laid in agony with it mangled. If Hydra cut off what was left of his arm. He wondered if Bucky was conscious or unconscious, or both. If Bucky knew that it was Hydra who found him. If Bucky thought maybe his team had found him. Steve wondered how many times Bucky reassured himself that the Howling Commandoes were looking for him. 

But did Steve look for him? No. No, Steve had frozen over, even before the plane went down. Did the Howling Commandoes look for Bucky? No. No, they were looking for Steve. When it turns out that they could have found Bucky, could have saved him from seven decades of torture. Seven decades of being frozen in a way that wasn't sacrificial at all-- it was just the storage of a weapon. Seven decades of restrictive gear, kill missions, no free will. 

As much as Steve wouldn't admit it to Sam, he was almost convinced that even if they did find Bucky that he would be beyond saving. It would be so difficult to come back from that. In fact, there were breakdowns when Steve almost decided to stop looking for Bucky indefinitely. Bucky wouldn't want to see him. Not after years of crying out his name during torture only to never be rescued. He had failed his best friend in every way possible. 

Steve tried to get himself thinking straight again but now he was roped into this undying loop of guilt and pain and the room was getting smaller and smaller as his thoughts and breathing got faster and faster and he felt like surrendering and letting the room that was closing in just crush him. So he did. 

 

_____________

 

He woke up staring at the ceiling. The fan was just above him and to the right, whirring softly. He was on the couch. Slowly, Steve sat up. Someone had moved him. His first thought was Sharon. She might not have just been a coincidental neighbor, and she wasn't a nurse, but she looked out for him. She had a key and would occasionally check in on him; once told him that she kind of felt like he was sorta her uncle, what with him having almost married her aunt and all. 

But he also knew it was’t Sharon. If Sharon would have come in his apartment to find that he was unconscious, she would have Sam over immediately as well as probably be tapping her foot waiting for him to wake up so she could interrogate him. So Steve was left with the question of who dragged him to the couch? 

His teapot whistled from the kitchen. Someone took it off the stove and Steve heard the hot water being poured. He stood and walked into the kitchen. 

“You should really clean up broken glass so that no one gets hurt.” Steve stood in the doorway to his kitchen, speechless. He was dreaming. There was no doubt in his mind— he was dreaming. Bucky showed up in his dreams all the time. Bucky picked up the mug and turned it around, coming face to face with Steve. Without saying a word, he placed the mug in front of Steve, but Steve didn’t move. 

His eyes were different. They didn’t look tortured like his dreams always imagined them to be. They were the same chocolate brown eyes that would stare into his underneath the same eyebrows that would scrunch in scrutinization while Steve would insist that he was fine. But there was something behind the eyes. It was detached. Something between his eyes and his brain had been disconnected. As soon as Steve begin to lose himself in those brown eyes he could see that there was a numbness there just like the one he himself felt. 

His voice wasn’t the same either. It was just as detached as his eyes. And his posture. It wasn’t relaxed, languid, cocky like it used to be. It was strict. Militarized. Ready to move at a moment’s notice and to follow orders. Just like a weapon, poised to strike. 

But there was some Bucky in there. Because he had made tea. He always made Steve tea when he was sick. Both of their mothers had believed strongly in herbal teas. Steve wanted nothing more than to hold him, make sure he was real. But he didn’t dare touch the man in front of him. Steve had been talking to therapists at Shield about the conduct in which to approach Bucky when he found him. They told him so many things about PTSD and how Bucky could have been affected by what Hydra did to him. This was the beginning of an extremely long process. 

“I think you need the tea more than I do,” Steve said, pushing the mug back towards Bucky. 

 

_____________

 

March 10, 2016 

“I would just like to say—” Tony began, before being cut off by groans from everyone else at the table. “I haven’t even started. Give me a chance!” Tony laughed. 

“No one wants to hear your speeches,” Natasha said, handing Steve the knife. 

“Well, I mean, if you really want to shut me up you can always give me the first piece of cake,” Tony retaliated. 

“Oh my god, do we really have to tell you each time one of us has a birthday that the first piece always goes—” 

“—to the host! Exactly,” Tony insisted. 

“Wait, how many pieces am I cutting this into?” Steve asked to no one in particular. There were about four different conversations going on at once around the large table. The entire team and more had gathered tonight for this special occasion. Across the cake were the words “Welcome to the 21st Century, Sergeant. You're 100 Years Old”, courtesy of Natasha— the steady hands of a trained assassin. 

Natasha, Tony, and Clint were now in a heated discussion about the pros and cons of Tony’s speeches. Scott and Sam were reliving a fight they had had upon their first encounter— Sam still insisting that he was not beaten and would have won completely if he could have just found his ant sized opponent. Rhodey was once again telling his favorite War Machine story, this time to Maria, Sharon, Jane, Bruce, Thor, anyone who would listen. And the birthday boy was yelling across the table at Wanda. They were both speaking in quick Russian and Steve wondered how they even understood anything the other was saying. Every now and then one of them would go silent at something the other had said and Pietro would laugh at them, occasionally making interjections himself. 

Eventually, everyone had a piece of cake in front of them and things went silent as the team ate. 

“So, I would just like to comment on how beautiful it is that we are all gathered here today,” Tony began, seizing the opportunity as soon as he saw it. “I think that it is remarkable to see just how much progress our guest of honor has made in his rehab.” He paused to take a breath to continue and Wanda swopped in. 

“Yes, thank you, Tony. That will be all.” 

“What is so horrendous about my speeches? I thought you all liked them.” 

“Tony, I swear to god.” Bucky began, laughter unable to stay hidden. “I will throw this fork across the table and into your eye if you try to make a speech. Hell, I would put this fork in my own eye if it means that you would shut up.” Bucky laughed his way through the sentence, the rest of the table laughing along with him. 

“Do you even remember the last speech you made?” Clint asked. 

"Yeah, yeah." Tony didn't sound too confident. "It was at someone's birthday..." 

There was a chorus of no's from across the room. "It was my anniversary," Clint said. Tony's face showed no recollection. 

"Yeah, I'm not surprised you don't remember," Bruce spoke up. "You were so dru--" 

"Well," Tony interjected. "then that's why it was terrible." 

"No, it was bad. The alcohol just made it worse," Steve said. 

The conversation continued in this natural way for the rest of the night, everyone bringing up a story of an event that Tony had ruined-- speech or no speech, alcohol or no alcohol. It was lighthearted. It felt normal, although the attendants were nowhere near normal. And after, they all cleaned up together like responsible adults who weren't going to leave all the mess for their host because Tony wouldn't clean it anyway. Then everyone went their separate ways for their separate things to do. Steve and Bucky headed back to Steve's apartment. 

"Oh my god, she's so loud," Steve said while unlocking the door. 

"She needs us just as much as we need her, doll," Bucky responded. It was small things like that that Steve actually noticed in Bucky's improvement. The way he would talk was the thing most like his old self. But everything else was different, slightly. The door swung open and their small orange tabby was immediately rubbing against Bucky's ankles. "Hello to you too, Cheez-it." Steve swooped down and picked the kitten up. 

He watched Bucky walk into the apartment and put his jacket by the door, kicking off his shoes. Bucky stored them nicely by the door because that's the kind of person he was-- put the shoes by the door, put the dishes in the dishwasher or at least the sink, put the cap back on the toothpaste, fix the pillow that was hanging out of its pillowcase. Steve was never like that, but he was getting better. Just like Bucky didn't flinch at every sound anymore, Steve knew exactly when his last shower was and always went grocery shopping on time with the list Bucky made him. And they complimented each other perfectly. 

They were happy. Aliens invading Earth wasn't exactly what they had expected their midlife crises would be like, but it was okay. Because every day would end with the two of them curled up in a cozy bed in Brooklyn, just like they had always hoped for. The anxiety cat was a new addition, but Cheez-it helped them almost as much as they helped each other. 

"This is the best birthday I have ever had," Bucky whispered in the close proximity of their bed. His eyes were closed and Steve laid across from him, watching the way his lips settled into a smile. "Always pictured a family in my life. Our friends are better than the most perfect family I ever imagined. And, I get you." 

He took Steve's hand in the semi-darkness. Steve leaned forward and kissed Bucky softly on the forehead. "You and me, Buck. 'Till the end of the line, whenever that may be."

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Please feel free to leave a comment and tell me what you thought or point out any typos-- I do also need a proofreader. You can also contact me @ agentsof-s-h-i-e-l-d.tumblr.com thank you so much!
> 
> Also, all fic information is on my profile.


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